Abstract
In 2003, I encountered Ronald J. Allen’s 2001 Interpretation essay on “Preaching and Postmodernism” (55.1) when writing a paper for a seminary course on the history of biblical interpretation. That essay expanded my understanding of preaching and showed me how scholars were pushing the field in exciting ways. Essays on preaching have appeared in Interpretation on an ongoing basis. The journal continues to promote reflection on the homiletical task, providing resources for those who preach and those who care about preaching, always through critical engagement with Scripture and theological issues. Interpretation’s last full issue on the topic was in 1997 and before that, 1981, so another issue dedicated entirely to preaching is long overdue. But I note Allen’s 2001 essay, because much of it is indicative of how the field of homiletics has moved in the twenty years since its publication. We might well draw lines from that essay and its themes to this issue.
This issue and the essays in it come at a critical juncture in the life of the church and the world. As the world shifts rapidly and in a multitude of ways, so do the church and its ministry of preaching. These essays, all written by early career scholars in homiletics, demonstrate keen sensitivity to what is going on in our world and deepen the practice of preaching through engaging a variety of disciplinary lenses. In that sense, they present a glimpse of how diverse the scholarly work in homiletics has become. But they also reflect the urgency, significance, and diversity of proclamation. Each author presses preaching forward in illuminating ways.
Donyelle McCray’s essay considers the role of wailing as prophetic speech. In so doing, she draws on biblical narratives of Mary the mother of Jesus, Margery Kemp, modern African American activist mourners, and artistic renderings of wailing to help reframe “sonic dimensions of the gospel” and “a channel for divine revelation.” In an age in which we all too often witness the public wailing of those who have suffered unspeakable losses, McCray attunes us to the possibility that their cries and tears serve as prophetic summons.
Focusing on indigenous preaching in Fiji, Jerusha Neal considers the interplay of the idea of place, the effects of colonialism on ecological devastation and approaches to climate science, and the multiple functions of sovereignty. Neal’s essay helps map a local theology that disrupts Western colonial tendencies to forge “easy essentialisms.” Instead, she demonstrates a thick description which results in a contextual homiletic that invites readers to enter into deeper relation with human and non-human creation.
Casey Thornburgh Sigmon’s essay invites readers to take the displacement of preaching in the U.S. to digital formats during the COVID-19 pandemic as an inflection point. She analyzes how the pulpit itself, an architectural feature in sanctuaries of White churches, has actively promoted White supremacy. Accordingly, she says, “The platform of the pulpit itself is not devoid of meaning, not devoid of its very own rhetorical power. The space itself is a partner in preaching, and a partner in condoning the centuries of colonization amplified from its space.” Thornburgh Sigmon calls White preachers to account for how the pulpit will be an anti-racist platform when the pandemic subsides.
Finally, my own essay seeks to extend the now generation-old idea of preaching as conversation. I have often wondered about the lack of reflection on the rhetoric of conversational preaching, even as theo-ethical descriptions flourish. This essay is an attempt to initiate a deeper look at the rhetoric of conversational preaching by focusing on the use of questions in sermons. More than innocuous rhetorical devices, questions are also theological, suggesting a great deal about how we see ourselves, how we see our listeners, and how we understand the task of preaching.